This election was the first one of the so-called Second Republic. If Italy had the strongest political stability in the previous 50 years, in twelve months it probably suffered the deepest democratic change ever in Western Europe. All the parties that ruled the country in the second half of the 20th century collapsed, under the political attack of the Northern League and the judiciary scandal of Mani pulite. After the electoral reform from the proportional representation to a prevalent FPTP system, the political spectrum was reorganized in three poles: the leftist Alliance of Progressives, the centrist Pact for Italy and the centre-rightist Pole of Freedoms. This latter was an alliance between the League and new liberal party Forza Italia of television entrepreneur and A.C. Milan President Silvio Berlusconi.
Berlusconi attacked the Progressives calling them a "communist" alliance, effectively subtracting quite all the former Socialist votes even if the Italian Socialist Party (PSI) was a member of that alliance: the PSI was consequently disbanded after 100 years of history, and the Alliance had little more than the traditional support of the former Italian Communist Party, then Democratic Party of the Left. Obtaining also more moderate votes than Christian Democracy's heir, the Italian People's Party (Pact), Berlusconi ensured the victory of his coalition, that in Lombardy resulted very profitable to the League, which obtained the absolute majority of the senators.
Electoral system
The intricate electoral system introduced in 1993, called Mattarella Law, provided 75% of the seats in the Senate as elected by first-past-the-post system, whereas the remaining 25% was assigned by a special proportional method that actually assigned the remaining seats to minority parties.
Redistricting
The new electoral law imposed the revision of the outdated design of the constituencies of 1948. After quite a half century, the agricultural south had lost population to the industrial Milan metropolitan area. The Province of Cremona and the Province of Pavia lost a seat, while new constituencies were added in the western and northern Milanese hinterland. The number of constituencies rose from 31 to 35.
